Other News Stories
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by Boundary Sentinel on Jun 30 2013 -
by Grand Forks and... on Jun 18 2013 -
by Contributor on Jun 17 2013 -
by Contributor on Jun 14 2013 -
by Shara JJ Cooper on Jun 14 2013
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Laura Duncan
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Mark Macdonald
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Mark Macdonald
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Mary Woodbury
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Mark Macdonald
Opinions
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by Murray Dobbin on Tuesday Jun 18 2013 -
by Contributor on Monday Jun 17 2013 -
by Miranda Holmes on Monday Jun 17 2013 -
by Arlen MacLaine on Thursday Jun 13 2013 -
by Amber Harper on Wednesday Jun 12 2013
Ms Miranda Holmes writes pretty good, however the editor obviously doesn't have the same skill. Surely you mean "this is an unfortunate" work of fiction by Miranda Holmes? ...and I'm not sure what the "fiction" is - that a rural reporter knows vastly more about the world than the Prime Minister elected by a plurality of Canadians in the last 3 (or is it 4?) elections? Grow up folks, this juvenile kind of rant attracts people to the Conservative agenda by default.
This little tid-bit reads like just another anti Harper, Liberal tirade. Maybe it will go better for your little group in the next election. In the mean time, take an asprin and call someone in the morning.
Go to http://www.facebook.com/powdermag?v=app_153839431317646&rest=1 to vote for Rossland/Nelson. Vote every 24 hours - this time the contest goes for 6 days. Get everyone to vote! This one's a matter of national ski pride!
Did someone come along to rescue you from your self inflicted wounds?
Regardless, peace and best wishes for the new year.
I think we have more than enough freeloaders in government now maybe we should vote in children, we have spoiled children now, could it be any worse? And to think these so called responsible dunces are representing Canada.
https://www.change.org/petitions/stop-the-proposed-middle-school-in-school-district-51-grand-forks-bc
The Royal Hotel is a business. They should have looked at it as such. Sorry, but that's a fact.
It would have been wise of them to bring in other partners, or maybe even made the community a partner.
Running the Royal as a bar will work. There's lots of folks out there still drinking. But it really is not big enough to operate as a showroom or club. To attract the right sort of players, you need seats so you can keep the costs down.
The boys would have been better off to purchase an old church or one of the club halls.
Nelson needs and deserves a good large venue where people can dance and relax. The Capital, and the Civic Theatre are decent venues, but that can't accomodate the real high energy touring acts.
I think it needs to come from the community as a whole though, unless there's a mulit millionaire around who doesn't mind not making a return for a few years.
PS: I get the part about selling alcohol. Basically, it makes you a drug dealer! Alcohol is a bad, bad drug, and selling it requires a certain degree of disapated conscience.
This is the best review I have read of one of Rosa's books. Andrew clearly knows a great deal about the real Cuba and the real America, and he writes very well.
There are some valid reasons for governing institutions to withhold information from the people who pay their salaries and stipends. But far more commonly secrecy is used to conceal mealfeasance and incompetence.
There would be far less staff time used handling freedom-of-information requests if secrecy was only applied for limited, clearly defined, and clearly valid reasons, such as protecting personal information about an employee.
One of the most shameful of the many shameful attitudes of recent councils has been the condemnation of councillors who have to resort to freedom-of-information to get the information they need to do their jobs, information the other councillors would need to do their jobs if they were not so determined to have staff do all their homework and all their thinking for them.
may have contributed to the decision-making. Shame.
Reading this article by Alex Atamanenko should give all peaceminded people encouragement. If enough of us want to see our country focus on a peace keeping mandate rather than a waring mandate, just like in Costa Rica we can make it happen. Let's get behind Bill 373 and support the work of Alex and his NDP collegues in promoting the proposal for a Department of Peace in our Canadian Parliament. Anyone wanting to sign a petition or get others to sign please contact Barry Nelson at bandw1@telus.net or 250-352-2704 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting
250-352-2704 FREE end_of_the_skype_highlighting and I can send you a petition that has already been vetted by the government that Alex will be able to present in parliament.
We have such a strong history as peace keepers and there are many leaders still working on promoting a culture of peace in our country. Therefore we already have people ready to support such a ministry in our government.
Forget Nietzsche, Charles, a chat with Rousseau may recharge your political batteries.
"The legislative power is the heart of the State, the executive power is its brain, which gives movement to all parts. The brain can fall into paralysis and the individual still lives. A man remains an imbecile and lives; but as soon as the heart has ceased its functions, the animal is dead." (Of the Social Contract, Book 3, [261]).
All our governments - they are neither conservative nor liberal, they all suffer from progressive authoritarianism - the brain rules. Their brains are on a course that will eventually kill the heart. They may well succeed, and when they do, historians will be writing about western politics of the 21st century by referring to the "American Spring" or the "Western Spring" or some such spring as we refer to the Arab Spring.
You need not be elected to be engaged in politics, you can write. So keep writing.
Why not add a Minister of Mediation e.g Mediator General of Canada?
I totally agree with your comment. If I have any criticism about it (just can't leave well enough alone) it is that the money, the pork, is a lesser problem compared to the damage the practice does to the respect and ethics essential to the craft not only of journalism, but also of diplomacy and democratic politics.
The conflict of interest guidelines in the Canadian Association of Journalists' ethics guidelines are weak in this respect, they should be reviewed by the profession in view of the examples given in your essay.
http://www.caj.ca/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Ethics-Guidelines.pdf
Re: thumbs. There appears to be some childishness going on here.
What an excellent and refreshing point of view to kick off (dare we hope?) the adult conversation called for. Thank you, Murry Dobbin!
Smart meter's will just end up costing us more money among other things.
Good luck having an adult conversaton with the current regimes in Ottawa and Victoria about anything!
I am not a poster generally in these forums, but I have to ask. Will one, if not all three, of you who have shown a thumbs down to Shelly's comment be brave and explain. Is it the blended learning model you are not keen on? If so, then why not? Or is it possible the thumbs down is a reaction to the idea that K-12 could dissapear in Rossland? I am having a tough time interpreting the three thumbs down in this case and would love some insight before jumping to any conclusions about what I am seeing. Thanks.
NDP ideology and focus groups.
What senior, soon to be a very large segment of the population, makes $85,000 and above? Yet, in order to generate enough revenue to make all this worthwhile you'll have to tap into that same large segment making less than $85,000.
Why do you ascribe such descriptions as sensible, neighbourly, compassionate and life-affirming? Are you saying Canadians are not these things?
Gosh, take a look around the world and see what true poverty is like with no chance of pulling oneself out of the depths of despair.
Tu te plains avec le ventre plein.
This is an article well worth reading. I've always felt that a majority of Canadians have decent, generous values but that these values are manipulated by politicians and by our 'first past the post' electoral system, often resulting in outcomes that go against these values.
Who disagrees with health care for seniors, protecting our forests, affordable tuition for working class kids? Rotten people, or people who have been cowed into a knee-jerk anti-tax stance by self-serving politicians. The items in the list above aren't expressions of political stances, they're just sensible, neighbourly desires.
And to those who will reply (as some will) that we can't afford to be sensible or neighbourly, I refer you to FDR and the New Deal or to Tommy Douglas and universal health care--compassionate, life-affirming policies adopted during worse economic times than ours. Policies that, with the benefit of hindsight, neither Harper Conservatives or US Republicans dare to fully undo even almost a century later.
You focused on one or two words as a basis for your reply when my comment was about participation.
That is a mistaken understanding of what democracy is. Take a look at the preamble to the Yukon's Municipal Ac (page 16)t:
http://www.gov.yk.ca/legislation/acts/municipal.pdf
It lists the principles on which the legislation is based. About half-way down the page you'll find:
"That public participation is fundamental to good local government."
That is the essence of democracy. Democracy is not about elections, it is about citizens participating in their own governance. A society cannot consider itself to be governed democratically if citizens do not participate.
Democracy is more about responsibilities than about rights.
As voters we tend to tune out until campaigns come along. Then we pay more attention. However, most don't make the effort to get out of their chairs to go out and vote.
Narrow ideologies seem to prevail in a number of ridings and no amount of information on broad national issues seem to engage them. I speak of NDP and Green.
Gone are the days when a leader could engage Canadians on a national vision of the country eg Trudeau Sr, Mulroney and Chretien to some extent .
We did ourselves a disservice when we punished the PCs (kim Campbell) to such a large extent. That just gave Reform the toe hold it needed to eventually morph into the Harper Conservative era.
We have a democratic system but as voters we do a poor job of exercising our democratic rights at election time. Nor do enough of us engage at policy meetings at the grass roots level. When we do, we seem to focus on the picayune and not broad national issues.
If we as voters don't care enough to engage then we get what we deserve.
Mandatory voting is unlikely to be instituted. One night, one result. How long do you want the voting to go?
As I said, if you want your candidate to win, get out the vote.
S/he who collects the most bottles, wins.